Audio equipment, for example home stereo system equipment and professional recording consoles, includes controls for manipulating audio effects, including, for example, panning, busing, volume and equalization. As used herein, panning refers to manipulating the balance of an audio signal, for example, from a left channel to a right channel. Volume control, as used herein, generally refers to the ability to increase and decrease the level of an audio signal. Also as used herein, equalization generally means manipulating various frequency ranges of an audio signal. Many more audio effects, including, for example, reverb, digital delay and the like are well known in the art and included in audio equipment.
Audio engineers operate prior art mixing consoles by controlling, for example, a series of switches, sliders, knobs and buttons in order to invoke potentiometers and switches that implement desired audio effects. Prior art mixing console are essentially closed systems, requiring audio technicians to monitor and operate the physical controls situated on or near the audio mixing console.
Live concert performances, especially those involving significant amplification in large venues, require audio engineers and/or audio technicians (referred to herein generally as “audio engineers”) to physically operate an audio mixing console in order to implement, for example, panning, equalization and volume control, and to obtain a quality mix of instruments and vocals in the many locations throughout the performance venue.
FIG. 1 illustrates an example live concert performance that utilizes a prior art audio mixing console. As shown in FIG. 1, music band 100 plays instruments that are amplified. An audio engineer 102 uses audio mixing console 104 to achieve a quality mix of the instruments comprising music band 100.
Audio effects that are controlled by the mixing console 104 comprise, inter alia, volume control 106, panning control 108, equalizer control 110, and bus volume controls 112.
Obtaining a quality mix using prior art mixing consoles 104 can be very time consuming, in part, because the audio engineer 102 must physically adjust the volume control 106, panning controls 108, equalizer 110 and other effects. Moreover, the mixing console 104 is typically situated at a central location within a performance venue, and, therefore, the audio engineer 102 only hears the audio mix of the music band 100 at the mixing console, and cannot hear the results of the mix from other locations within the performance venue. Accordingly, audio engineers 102 rely on feedback from other audio engineers who report on the quality of the mix from various locations within the performance venue. This problem is exacerbated by very large performance venues.
Since audio engineers 102 typically operate mixing consoles 104 at a central location where the audio mixing console 104 is located, many areas, especially those in a very large performance venue, for example, a sports stadium complex, may suffer from a low quality mix because the audio engineer 102 operating the mixing console 104 is not fully informed of the quality of the mix in those areas.
Therefore, the time required to produce a quality mix remains significant because of prior art mixing consoles 104. Furthermore, some venues, especially large ones with many thousands of seats, maintain areas which suffer from a poor quality mix throughout a live concert performance.